


It's simple

by CravenWyvern



Series: DS Extras [104]
Category: Don't Starve (Video Game)
Genre: Implied Relationships, Other characters mentioned - Freeform, Starvation, Vent writing that got out of hand, headcanons galore
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-09
Updated: 2021-01-09
Packaged: 2021-03-13 01:42:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,458
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28645431
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CravenWyvern/pseuds/CravenWyvern
Summary: Have a use, or be discarded.
Series: DS Extras [104]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/688443
Kudos: 16





	It's simple

It had been an experiment, of course. A terrible one, but one nonetheless.

Higgsbury might have found that funny, if they had still been on speaking terms. Maxwell crushed that nagging little worm of an urge to snicker, the thought was an awfully amusing one, but he's not spoken to the other man in quite awhile. The benefits of separating his camp from theirs, he supposed.

The fire flared up as he sluggishly tossed a log into it, small flames he had carefully encouraged up now eating through the wood with a greed he almost envied, but the hollow emptiness had eased up for a bit. Having to shovel the new fallen snow out of his area, shove to the sides of his small camp as best as he could, had drained him of too much energy.

And his experiment, as awful as it was, has given him the most obvious of results.

Maxwell stopped for a moment, swayed on his own two feet as a cold breeze came drifting in, signalling fast approaching night. Another storm may blow in under the cover of darkness, coat his camp once more in thick flurries and snow drifts.

At this point, wobbling as his balance rose and fell in strength, the former Nightmare King was certain he'd not live to see what would become of his belovedly hated campsite. The hunger started its gnaw on his belly once more, this time ten times worse, nipping and biting and now tearing, and it curdled through his limbs and his body trembled without his control as it started to eat itself alive.

He had enough know how to have learned that, at the very least. When external supplies were no longer available, then the body is forced to auto cannibalize. 

Maxwell half fought another snicker, a sharp, shuddering exhale escaping him. Higgsbury had told him that, once upon a time.

He shouldn't think of the man as much as he did. They had parted with at least some polite cordial talk, after the other man had died from the hounds and been gone for months before the portal finally spat him out whole again, and Maxwell was understanding enough, he knew enough and was agreeable. 

Time was odd here, things changed in vastly unpredictable ways, and if Wilson wanted nothing to do with him any longer, memories and trauma bare and clear in his mind now, a courtesy gift from the Queen no doubt, then so much the better. Maxwell understood, and he accepted it.

The inevitable, as always. The other man wouldn't stay with him all the time, after all, he shouldn't expect that, not here, not within the Constant, where one's frame of mind could just change and twist and _remember_ from the simplest of temporal shifts. Wilson remembered him in poor taste, this time around; Maxwell would not force himself or his presence upon the man if that was the case.

In a way, he recognized, it was pitiful, his little experiment. He knew the end result already, far too well.

He knew the truth, perhaps better than anyone else here.

It took a moment, to realize his knees were starting to tremble, his weight becoming too much, and Maxwell slowly blinked, mind turning sluggishly as he shivered and swayed for a few moments more. The thing that subsided as his heart thumped unevenly within his chest, hard and uncomfortable, a hint of rasping pain as he shifted, as he moved, but all the old man did was drop one extra log into the fire, allowed it to a blaze, then turned away and hobbled to his worn out, patchwork sewn tent.

A crooked ugly thing, unbecoming for him, or perhaps the person he had once been. Maybe it now matched him, in its addled haggard glory.

That thought was a hint funny as well, but there wasn't enough energy in him to react to it. Not nearly enough, just the bare bones, and his vision swayed, flared and then smeared a hint sickeningly as Maxwell half crawled, half slumped into his tent. The cold bedding, frayed rabbit fur and much too old beefalo, offered handouts he had taken months ago from the others when he had left, did not comfort him in the slightest as he shakily let himself collapse down upon them.

That thing in his chest was becoming erratic, loud and thumping much too heavy, painful, and Maxwell slowly curled his arms about himself, curled up as his eyes closed and the snow started to fall just outside of his cold, unhelpful shelter. 

His experiment had given him results he had already known about, but false hope had spurred on such action. The idea had spawned within his mind almost randomly seasons ago, while out checking the traps by the frog ponds, decimating the young hoppers whenever they drew too close. 

Well, perhaps not right then, no, only started its first graces, but it bloomed into his aware mind the moment he had trawled his way back into their little ugly camp, passed the thick wood gates and that horrid warped bell. The old woman had received him politely enough, took stock of the frog legs he had packed and stacked up for the lot of them, and then the viking woman had come around to haul away the bounty he had acquired.

He had almost gotten ready to depart without noticing, but the moment his near empty pack made itself known Maxwell had snapped a few hissing words to Wickerbottom as she tallied whatever she was tallying on her papers. His complaints were brushed off with ease, she pursed her lips and shrugged her shoulders, and then Wigfrid had stuck her nose into the conversation.

The argument had gotten worse, almost physical as he spat and snapped at his ill treatment, _he_ had been the one to bring back the frogs, _he_ had killed and caught and hauled the bloody things over here, and then Wickerbottom tutted and mentioned his lacking toll, how much _has_ he contributed this season, how much _should_ he be allotted for his work-

He had almost drawn his sword at that, he was being robbed was what was happening, but then that blasted warrior woman had slammed him against one of those wooden walls, held him back with only a singular arm, and gave him a very threat laced scolding on drawing weapons on another within camp.

He had fallen a bit low there, Maxwell could hardly stand it nowadays when something, or someone, attempted to keep him still, manhandle him, and it was uncalled for to bite her but Wigfrid had kept her cool, kept her head.

He still remembered her steely eyes, the stoic glare as his teeth drew blood, before she shoved her arm at him and near cracked his jaw in half from his own stupidity and pathetic need to get out of being held down, leaning forward as her voice drew to a whisper-

_"The weak are meat, and the ströng dö eat. And yöu, beast of Löki, are **weak."**_

And then she had let him go, Wickerbottom practically howling in an irritated rage at the behavior, and in the end Wigfrid went about to treat her new snaggled wound and Maxwell had been unanimously sent out of the camps protective walls just as dusk arrived and that god awful bell started its wailing.

His pack had still been empty, as he had trudged his way back to his own camp, not a single frog leg left in reward for his work.

That had only been a few months ago, really, a small seed or agitation taking root as Maxwell nursed his bruised jaw and even more bruised ego, internally snarling at the warrior woman's words, debating upon it by his lonesome. Obviously he continued contributing to that horrid place, handing his hauls off and getting little in return, unless what he handed over seemed sufficient enough to be allowed to stay for a meal, as lackluster as it usually was. The chef wasn't around to cook anymore, not for a good long while; the portal would eventually spit him out, but for now Maxwell wondered spitefully if Warly was in a much better off place. 

As the seasons changed, so too did that nagging thought, that nibbling idea. His lone existence out here, broken only by his visits to the main camp and, for brief, agonizingly awkward moments, happening upon the others in the wilds from time to time, allowed quite a bit of time for solitary thought.

_The weak are meat, and the strong do eat._

Wigfrid could be quite vicious at times and he should know, as former Nightmare King, but that sounded more like out of Their mouths and not some irrational pawn. 

In the end, Maxwell supposed it made quite a good bit of sense; he was not comparable to most of the others in any strength category, and even his own wiles and magic usage barely could keep pace with the raw nature of someone like Wigfrid or Wolfgang. Hell, even old Wickerbottom had a one up over him, what with her having the bodyguards in the first place.

The children were a given, the mime a leech that had been smart enough to make just the right allies, the firestarter sharp and much too dangerous to be tasked as _weak_ \- even Higgsbury had more strength than him, in near all respects besides resistance to temptation. 

Maxwell supposed, then, that his lesser abilities in comparison has made him pack mule for the lot of them. Going out and gathering, hauling back near everything just to be allowed a bit of a reward at the end; of course the strong do eat, when he provided everything he had to them.

Why do it? Eventually that caught him next, as he tangled with the ugly buzzards that ate the dead of the desert, and whenever one fell the others came swooping in just for the smallest of bites.

He cleaved most of them that way, the birds rather stupid in their blind bid for a scrap of food. The energy he used then wasn't nearly as draining, allowing the foul fowl corpses to pile up as he took each out, before eventually Maxwell thought he had enough and started tying them up by their limp feet, stuffing into his pack or hanging them along the threads, dripping bird blood and dark, greasy feathers all about him. 

The nagging thought, as all this extra food he himself had acquired was eventually handed over to the others at camp, the old woman checking him off and leaving a singular bird for himself before he took his leave out before those accusing scowls turned ugly, came back as he headed out.

_Why give them all that, when he could just keep it all for himself?_

He had caught it, after all; why must he, the weak, feed them, the strong? What use was this exchange?

...Ironic, in a way, that he now knew the reasoning for the baseline. All it took was for the weather to turn foul, for winter to head in unexpectedly early. Maxwell had no time to prepare for the snowfall, the blizzards.

And his small camp, unprepared, had nothing stocked with which to help him.

Unfortunate, that he had stopped handing off his spoils to the main camp weeks ago, his small, vain little experiment starting simple, easy. Giving only half, then a third, a fourth, dwindling as he snidely met the old womans disapproving frown with a masked cleverness, until finally he stopped visiting all together. 

Now, however, keeping what he found for himself, as little as it was now with the chilly weather, had kept him alive enough to survive the long, cold nights, but when he eventually had to accept defeat, thin and weak after a bad hound attack, spiders chasing him off from even harvesting that foul monster flesh, those great gates had not opened.

It was not due to lack of manpower; he could see the flickering bonfire within, and the briefest flash of a lantern above, atop the walls, but the cold silence in answer spoke volumes.

He was not welcome there anymore, not when he no longer had any use to them.

Maxwell huffed, chest aching in weak bursts of airy inhales, harsh exhales, almost chuckles as his cold gloved hands curled into the worn out furs of his bedding. There was hardly any warmth in here, and his empty stomach, drained dry energy reserves, gave him no respite.

Starvation had not been his end goal, not at all, and yet the Nightmare King found himself almost deliriously wondering if it was a fitting fate. Becoming weak, feeble as the days had passed and the cold snow piled up, the easy food sources he had once started taking for himself drying up, and now there was nothing left for him to survive upon.

He supposed, had he stuck true to the lot of fools within those wooden walls, with their stupid little bell, then they might have rationed enough out for him, just the amount to keep him coming back to hand over resources in exchange for...for just a scrap of food.

A wild guess, really; perhaps they'd turn cannibalistic, and when the going got tough within cold dead winter he might have ended up as main course eventually.

A dark thought, and not a pleasant one, but the former Nightmare King wheezed a last few chuckles out, his gut twisting within him, makeshift heart fit to bursting as he gulped in shallow breaths of frozen air, shivered and shook in weak, starving fits. His death throes, to leave a thinned out, frozen corpse behind in his tent; would the portal dump him elsewhere, or was he to haunt as ghastly spirit till someone revived him? 

And, if they ever did, would he find himself turning back to his former role, harvester for the strong in their wooden thick walls as he himself slowly grew weaker and weaker from lack of? 

Then again, they had always given him enough to keep standing, enough to keep being useful. If he returned to them, then perhaps he'd end up living for much longer.

That is, if they revived him, and if he didn't awaken far elsewhere within the Constant.

Maxwell shuddered, gasps growing shallow as the pressure grew thicker, old false heart failing him, and he wondered, for a sluggish, agonizing time, if he was just pathetic enough to give in and crawl his way back to them with his tail between his legs, cowed from his attempt to survive all on his lonesome.


End file.
